The Battle Abbey Roll. Vol. I.
by
The Duchess of Cleveland.

Prepared by Michael A. Linton
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Busshell : or Bussell; Buscel, according to Leland; Barons of Penwortham in the county of Lancaster. "Penwortham, the most northern of the parishes of Leyland hundred, contained one of the ancient castles of Lancashire, erected to guard the estuary of the Ribble when the channel of that river was wider than at present, and when the ancient city of Ribchester formed a Roman station. It was bestowed by William the Conqueror on Roger de Busli, joint lord of the hundred of Blackburn, and it is highly probable that the castle of Penwortham was one of the baronial residences of that favourite of his sovereign. Warine Bussel, supposed to have been the son (or brother) of Roger de Busli, was his successor, and ranks as the first Baron of Penwortham."—Baine's Lancashire. In Kenion's MS. he is styled Warinus Busli or Bushel. His son Richard was in possession in Henry I.'s time, and either he or his father founded a small Benedictine monastery there, which became a cell of Evesham Abbey. Richard left only daughters, and "to him," says Dugdale, "succeeded Albert his Brother: who had Issue Hugh. Which Hugh, being dispossess'd by John Earl of Moreton, had a Suit with him for it, and recovered it: But when John came to the Crown, he was constrained to give him XX Marks, for a Confirmation of his Title; and in 4 John four hundred Marks more, for a new Grant; having forfeited his Title, by some default, as was pretended. But long he enjoy'd it not; for in 7 Joh. Roger de Laci, Constable of Chester, had a Grant of it from that King." According to Baines, however, Hugh's brother Robert, was the last and fifth baron of the name of Bussel. The principal branch of the family ended soon afterwards. "Warin Bussel, the second of the name, had Robert Bussel of Leyland, whose heiress Avicia was married in 14 Henry III. to John de Farrington." But some of his kin evidently survived; for Baines tells us that "Spout, in the township of Euxton, was formerly the residence of the Bushels; of whom was Dr. Bushel, the founder of Goosnargh Hospital."

"Roger Buissel" is entered in Domesday as holding Sutton in Somersetshire. "This Roger," says Collinson, "was progenitor of the family of Bingham, who resided in this place, and gave it the addition of their name:" but why they called themselves Bingham he does not inform us. The Somersetshire line ended with an heiress in the time of Henry III.; but the family was of longer continuance in Devonshire. "Newton-Bushell was named from the Bushells, its possessors in the latter half of the thirteenth century. Teignweek was given in 1246 to Theobald de Englishville, and by him to his foster child and kinsman Robert Bushell. The Bushells continued until Richard II., when their heiress brought it to the Yardes. Bradley has long been the seat of the Lords of Newton-Bushell, and although much mutilated, still remains an interesting example in many of its details of a fortified mansion in the 13th century."—Worth's Devon. Other branches of the Bushells existed in Dorsetshire, Warwickshire, Hertfordshire, Nottinghamshire, and Kent.